Saturday, December 30, 2017

The Drowned World


Climate Central's Surging Seas map has always been a very effective visualization of the possible effects of rising sea levels. It is even more effective when you combine it with Google Earth's incredible 3d map of the world.

Google Earth for the web now supports kml files. This means that you can import the Surging Seas: Extreme kml file into Google Earth and explore how rising seas might effect the USA. The realism of Google Earth's 3d buildings really increases the impact of Climate Central's rising seas model and helps to communicate the effect of global warming on our coastal towns and cities.

Surging Seas: Extreme is based on the 'extreme' scenario published in NOAA's report into Global and Regional SLR Scenarios for the U.S. (January 2017). Unfortunately for Donald Trump if global warming does exist then he can say goodbye to Mar-a-Lago which will be almost completely inundated by rising seas under this model (mind you Trump will be dead by then so why should he care).

By the total number of the population affected using this model Florida would be the most affected state, followed by New York, California, Virginia, and New Jersey. Florida is also the most affected state by the percentage of the population affected, followed by Hawaii and Louisiana.

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